


off-brand, poetic bush fire of a lifestyle

by gortysproject



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: M/M, POV Second Person, Unhealthy Relationships, Warren Kepler's One (1) Feeling, but also a lot of pent up feelings about kepler's perspective on life for the last season and a half, feelings drabble for post-ep 55
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-09
Updated: 2017-10-09
Packaged: 2019-01-15 05:02:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12314283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gortysproject/pseuds/gortysproject
Summary: that’s the problem with your off-brand, poetic bush fire of a lifestyle; survival comes first, and anything else is optional. romance is something you can indulge in when there’s time, when there’s hope, when you have the upper hand.if it started to get in the way of my work, i could get rid of it, and things would be… well, they’d be more or less fine. i’d be sad, but life would go on.





	off-brand, poetic bush fire of a lifestyle

**Author's Note:**

> me, yelling into the ether: WHY DID KEPLER STILL PROTECT JACOBI IN EP 55

you’ve always been a romantic, in a novelty sort of way—long, detailed stories, sweeping your audience off their feet; endless glowing metaphors that drip from your fingertips, because _you? you’re this whiskey_ , and scotch always looked prettiest in the sunlight; running your tongue with shakespeare regardless of who wants to listen—you’re a romantic, because life has pleasures wherever you choose to look for them, and it makes it far less necessary to seek out your own.

he is a pleasure in himself, you decide, and spin him around your fingertips in a way you’d like to describe as _poetic_ , bound in blood, biting down on his throat to mark your ownership and pressing a hand to the small of his back to guide him with you—

romance is fun.

attachment, less so.

you might fall in love on a dusty highway in the middle of nowhere, the moon large, his skin cold, blood spilling from the corner of his mouth but his lips still tilted up in the lazy grin you’d never be able to forget. your hands press against the wound, kneeling above him in the back of a car, brows knitting together in concentration because _you’re not going to die today, it would be such a waste_. your fingers don’t tremble as you patch him up. your knuckles don’t whiten on the wheel while you drive him to the hospital. you don’t sit awake through the night by his bed.

_you don’t, warren?_

_no, sir._

except you do.

it’s _inconvenient_ , beyond anything—affection always has been. romance is fun, but this is painful. you have much better things to do with your time than graze your lips over his knuckles. you have more important people to keep your eye on—that’s why _he’s_ the one who watches your back. but you watch him, and you shield him, and you hold his arm too tight and growl your warnings when he screws up just as you drop a kiss against his hair when he falls asleep on your sofa.

your affection burns brightly and fiercely and dangerously, but it’s his day job to play with fire.

he thanks you for it, desperately, feverishly, hands shaking when they touch your face, cheeks burning when you press him against the glass and hiss a threat as easily as you’d drop trash in the can. but a pattern emerges, and it’s sickening, because no matter how barbed your romance is, how double-edged your affections are, _he loves you back_.

inconvenient, as you said.

he’d die for you, over and over again, and he was never one for poetry so he turns his gaze aside when you murmur _how profound, daniel_ against his skin. he doesn’t mean it as a gesture, a rose between his teeth, a lock and key etched into your hearts (because _he_ never was a romantic, but you think that’s why you love him). he means it as a truth, a naked honesty that you’ve earned, a final gasp from a drowning man who needs you to know that he stopped swimming for _you_.

falling in love is ridiculous. maxwell would agree—maxwell always agrees, and she does so while pushing her glasses back and turning her nose up at whatever self-destructive habits he has tripped into this time to please you.

you like having control over him.

you prefer it when he has a little control over himself.

he’s an impressive man, when he holds his head up high, straightens his back and nods with respect—he’s little more than prey when he clutches your legs, worshipful, begging for instruction.

(one thing you know, though, one thing you’ll always know, a pendant round your neck, a promise etched into your ribs: he’d die for you. he loves you, and he’d die for you. he’d do anything for you.)

 

* * *

 

you cradle that empty promise against your chest, now, carving a hole where your heart used to be, because somewhere along the way, you forgot how not to trust him. your mistake.

_yes_ , maxwell mattered. _yes_ , he was aching, and you didn’t know how to stop that, you _couldn’t_ stop that. _yes_ , when he spun poisonous words and flung them in your direction, you knew he meant them, and you let him grieve. he’d earned it.

_no_ , you never imagined he’d betray you.

you loved him. it’s sickening, but you loved him, whether it was the unending loyalty or the fondness in his eyes when he looked at you or the curve of his lips as he gazed at the destruction he created—you loved him. you trusted him. now, you get to stand at the barrel-end of a gun and receive a crash course on what a mistake that was.

you don’t love him now. you tell minkowski to point a gun at him and pull the trigger. your voice is careful not to waver on the words.

that’s the problem with your off-brand, poetic bush fire of a lifestyle; survival comes first, and anything else is optional. romance is something you can indulge in when there’s time, when there’s hope, when you have the upper hand. _if it started to get in the way of my work, i could get rid of it, and things would be… well, they’d be more or less fine. i’d be sad, but life would go on._

you keep your life, your pathetic body and your pathetic plans, but none of them are worth a dime anymore without him on your side. you don’t love him now. you watch him work, launching probe after probe into an irresolvable mess, and you don’t love him anymore.

survival comes first; caring about him is an afterthought.

at least, that appeared to be the case, until mr cutter levelled a metaphorical gun at his head and quirked a smile as he asked victor riemann to pull the trigger. it’s a rollercoaster you never asked for; you trip over yourself to stop the cart.

_sir, jacobi has shown exemplary skill and dedication throughout the—_

you wish your voice hadn’t shook. you wish you’d achieved _anything_ with the outburst. you wish he’d look at you, one more time, before he’s herded out of your life forever.

it doesn’t get more poetic than a wish. it doesn’t get more shakespearean than a wish ignored by the universe.

the best romances, after all, are tragedies.

**Author's Note:**

> find me @aihera on tumblr if this was vaguely comprehensible


End file.
